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Monday, August 19, 2013

Doggie Lit for Dog Days with Guest Lois Winston

Dog Days continue today with author & agent Lois Winston, who has some observations on the rise of genre "doggie lit." Welcome back, Lois! ~ Sheila

Doggie
Lit?

by Lois Winston

Over the last few years there have been many
sub-genres of lit-fic cropping up. It started back in the late nineties with an
onslaught of chick lit. These were stories not about furry yellow-beaked farm
critters but about twenty-somethings with jobs they hated, serial bad dates, a
tendency to indulge in too many margaritas, and an obsession with designer
shoes and handbags. Chick lit led to lady lit, lad lit, mom lit, hen lit,
boomer lit, and geezer lit.

And now we have doggie lit. I’ve noticed over
the last few years that no matter the genre, whether romance or mystery or
straight fiction, a huge percentage of books have dogs in them. It’s not just
that the protagonist has a pet pooch. These dogs are becoming major secondary
characters in many books. Sometimes they even have a point of view in the
story.

I’m not sure how I feel about giving a point of
view to a pet, but I do like the trend of making dogs in books more than just
window dressing or a convenient way to get a character from Point A to Point
B. (Dogs do have to be walked several
times a day.) If done well, dogs can add quite a bit of texture and color to
the story because they have distinct personalities.

In my Anastasia Pollack Crafting Mystery
series, Anastasia’s mother-in-law Lucille, a die-hard nineteen-fifties style
commie, owns a French Bulldog she calls Manifesto (after the communist
treatise.) Everyone else calls him Mephisto or Devil Dog. He’s got that kind of
personality. Since the best stories always have characters who are polar
opposites, thus creating conflict, I’ve given Manifesto his own nemesis, a
corpulent white Persian by the name of Catherine the Great.

Catherine the Great belongs to Anastasia’s
mother Flora, a former social secretary of the Daughters of the American
Revolution. Lucille, Manifesto, Flora, and Catherine the Great all live with
Anastasia, her two teenage sons, and their pet parrot in a small suburban
rancher where Lucille and Flora (and therefore Manifesto and Catherine the
Great) are forced to share a bedroom. Not only do Flora and Lucille fight like
cats and dogs, but so do their cat and dog. Conflict, conflict, conflict—the
basis for all good stories, right?

Another component of a good stories is
character growth. So I wondered, why should that growth be limited to the
two-legged characters in a story? Revenge
of the Crafty Corpse, the third book in my series, presented the perfect
opportunity to delve into this subject. Because Lucille is in a rehab center
convalescing from surgery, the rest of the family must care for Manifesto. The
results are quite surprising, but I won’t spoil the fun for you. You’ll just
have to read the book to find out for yourself.

Revenge
of the Crafty Corpse

Anastasia
Pollack’s dead louse of a spouse has left her with more bills than you can
shake a crochet hook at, and teaching craft classes at her mother-in-law’s
assisted living center seems like a harmless way to supplement her meager
income. But when Lyndella Wegner—a 98-year-old know-it-all with a penchant for
ruffles and lace—turns up dead, Anastasia’s cantankerous mother-in-law becomes the
prime suspect in her murder. Upon discovering that Lyndella’s scandalous craft
projects—and her scandalous behavior—made her plenty of enemies, Anastasia sets
out to find the real killer before her mother-in-law ends up behind bars.

Award-winning author Lois Winston writes the
critically acclaimed Anastasia Pollack Crafting Mystery series featuring
magazine crafts editor and reluctant amateur sleuth Anastasia Pollack. Assault With a Deadly Glue Gun, the
first book in the series, received starred reviews from both Publishers Weekly and Booklist. Kirkus Reviews dubbed it, “North Jersey’s more mature answer to
Stephanie Plum.” Other books in the series includes Death By Killer Mop Doll, Revenge
of the Crafty Corpse and the ebook only mini-mysteries Crewel Intentions and Mosaic
Mayhem.

Lois is also published in women’s fiction, romance, romantic suspense, and
non-fiction under her own name and her Emma Carlyle pen name. In addition,
she’s a literary agent and an award-winning craft and needlework designer. She often draws much of her source material for both her characters and
plots from her experiences in the crafts industry.

On my dedication page of my adult paranormal-romance, "Immortal Relations" "For me, Dogs are God's gift to mankind to teach us about love and loyalty - they deserve our love and loyalty in return!" And the story has a freshly changed (good) vampire saving a dog. My third in the series has two dogs taking on more relevant parts in the story. Don't have the canines doing a talk show, but that is an idea! LOL

I love dogs in stories. The Alaskan Malamute featured in my latest book is modeled after my own Mal who is featured on the cover. But what would you expect from someone who counts Lady and the Tramp as one of the greatest love stories of all time?

Of course there's "doggie lit." And I'll confess that I've never been a fan of pet POV...and then I started writing it in my thrillers! But like Sheila, the pets have to be "real" and not talking humans wearing fur for me to enjoy the read. And yes, they have conflicts, wants and likes, and more.

It makes sense to follow US household trends since something like 34% of 'em have pets and consider them part of the family. Love the post!

Well, for one, I love the Pet POV.But I also listen to Lilian Jackson Braun's The Cat Who...books over and over.Love the doggie as a character; however, I think you need to give equal time to the feline protagonists. See previous sentence. ;-)

I loved the post and the sweet doggie faces.My coon hound/Beagle combo, Beauty, says she agrees.

Great post and I'm adding lots of books to my TBR list. I love the Chet and Bernie mysteries by Spencer Quinn, which are narrated by the dog, Chet. And my own Doodlebugged mysteries are narrated by the labradoodle. Not uncoincidently, my labradoodle serves as the cover model for the books.

Thanks for stopping by, Susan. I'll have to check out your books. I think the only book I ever read with a dog narrator was a paranormal romance years ago where a woman dies and comes back as a dog to make amends for not being such a nice person as a human.

I kind of remember that book--didn't really grab me. The Quinn books are wonderful, at least for mystery and dog fans. They're not really cozies, but they're not graphic or violent. My books are ostensibly middlegrade mysteries, but are actually aimed at and have had good response from dog and mystery lovers of all ages.